{"sf1_id":542331,"sf2_id":"lmX4jL0m","title":"Foxy Goes Dark","author":"KevinFoxboy","words":1758,"posted_at":"2013-05-24T00:24:00.000Z","tags":["Fantasy","Fox","Spiritualism","wildlife"],"url":"https://fse.anthro.fr/stories/542331-foxy-goes-dark","original_url":"https://sofurry.com/s/lmX4jL0m","image_url":"https://cdn.sofurryfiles.com/submissions/thumbnails/69/3b/693b9cee-6111-422b-98d8-cc67e979b2ee","description":"The Wildlife Protector Fox starts down the Dark Path...","content":" Foxy Goes Dark - 2010-0128.2158  \n  \nI'm a Wildlife Protector Fox. I useta be human but got shot  \nand killed trying to protect some deer. The hunters didn't need the  \nfood, they just thought it was 'fun' to chase and kill someone. How  \ncome you humans think it's OK to just kill us animals? You're just  \nbeing naughty; we're not attacking you!  \n  \nEspecially since you don't kill quickly; you just hurt others.  \nThat makes you \\*really\\* naughty, and I go Dark! I have to kill to end  \nsomeone's suffering, feel their pain; so I catch the hunter and put  \nthat pain on \\*him\\*!  \n  \nIt's a moral struggle every time. Lester the previous Pro-  \ntector died saving me, so I never got to talk with him. He passed  \nhis power to me, but not his wisdom. You humans even hate each  \nother, and I have to get that hate in me because I'm Protector.  \n  \nAnd when you shoot someone just minding their own business in  \nthe woods, they feel hate too; for the act, not always the human. I  \nhave to get their hate and pain in me, and I want to kill the hunter.  \n  \nBut if I just kill predators I break Nature's balance. That's  \nthe struggle; I can't just do what I feel like. The hate rises and  \nfesters, and has no outlet. Often I go to a secret spot away from  \neveryone else, and vent my frustration and rage!  \n  \n\n\u0026nbsp; \\*  \n  \nYou humans just see strange lights in the woods, and hear  \nweird loud noises. The forest dwellers know to stay away when I'm  \nlike this; they've passed down stories of previous Protectors going  \nDark.  \n  \nSorry to disappoint all you Fox Mulder fans, but most of The  \nTruth That's Out There isn't extraterrestrials, it's just a furry Fox  \nlike me drawing on the life force all around us and venting his rage.  \nEspecially on the unfortunate humans who get in my way; you shouldn't  \nbe out in the woods at night anyway!  \n  \nIt was only about a month after I became Protector that I  \nfound the Ring of Death. My forest animal friends seemed nervous  \nabout the area as I explored the woods. As a Fox I chewed on some  \nberries in between pouncing on insects and small lizards, rodents  \nand birds. They're quite yummy, don't knock it till you try it.  \n  \nAnd Lester's scent was all over the place, so intense it was  \nalmost sickening. I thought somehow Les was back and heard his laugh;  \nI thought I was going nuts already until he got angry at my weakness.  \nI was sure I was nuts now.  \n  \n\n\u0026nbsp; Lester Fox had been Protector for fifty years. He'd Gone Dark  \nso many times fighting humans, come here to vent, left part of himself.  \nYou can call it his soul if you want, or his ka, or whatever. The hate  \nhe'd gotten from all those humans had poisoned his soul, turned his  \ninnate goodness against itself, left him bitter and spiteful and ...  \n  \n\\*  \n  \nLester didn't need Lord Sauron or his One Ring to poison him;  \nall it took was humans with their hate, bitterness, and disdain for us  \nanimals. This part of the forest had been a beautiful meadow, with a  \nstream wandering through; trees lining the banks, fish jumping and  \nfrogs croaking. Just a wonderful relaxing sunlit place to doze off  \nand revel in Nature's beauty.  \n  \nUntil humans came. They saw and thought it restful and lovely.  \nSo they had to light a fire and kill the fish and frogs. Les got really  \nmad and went so Dark he never really came back. He killed the humans,  \nfried the grass; his rage and hate sucked on the life force of the  \nforest and turned the meadow into a raging inferno!  \n  \n\n\u0026nbsp; Everyone got scared of their Protector Fox, and Les fed on the  \nfear too. He was beyond talking to, beyond reason; he'd stop the humans  \nfrom coming back here by turning the beauty into a Ring of Death where  \nnothing would live, nothing grow, nothing bring the evil humans back!  \n  \nLester's hate consumed him, burned his flesh; when nothing  \nremained alive he relented and went looking for more humans to kill.  \nIn that state, his fur burned off, his hate still seething, he didn't  \nneed to walk on his paws; he just floated above the ground with his  \neyes burning red -- the legends of werefoxes explained.  \n  \nHe didn't look like a normal fox, but a burned, twisted  \nmonster bent on revenge.  \n  \n\\*  \n  \nThat's the story the forest animals told me, I guess to warn  \nme about the danger I faced: more than from the humans, the danger  \nwas from myself!  \n  \nAs I said, Lester never really came back from his inferno.  \nSure he Protected the forest, it was his destiny; but the Dark Path  \ndominated from then on. He stopped teaching predators and prey, and  \nthe balance of life in the woods suffered.  \n  \n\n\u0026nbsp; And then I came along. I'd hiked around the West End and  \nthrough part of the woods, coming out on weekends for about a year  \nand trying to learn. OK, yeah, I wanted to treat animals like my pet  \ncats, holding them and rubbing their furry bodies for my own fun, not  \ntheirs. But the cats kept coming around me, even knowing what I was  \ngonna do to them.  \n  \nThat's actually what I had in mind when I saw the deer. Sneak  \nup on em and fondle em, like it was a petting zoo. I never saw the red  \nburning eyes of the Dark Lester on my walks; but he realised I wasn't  \nshooting anyone so I wasn't naughty, and he didn't crisp me with a  \nlightbolt.  \n  \nHe was busy at the Ring of Death venting his anger when he  \nheard the shots. He moved faster than any animal, at the speed of  \nthought because of his power; but by then he was old and weak, and  \nhe still couldn't get to the deer fast enough to save them all.  \n  \nHe saw me run in front of the deer, between them and the  \nhunters who'd shot two. Not for food, so they were naughty. He was  \ngonna go Dark again when something stopped him; I was trying to stop  \nthe bleeding of a shot deer, crying over her pain. Then the second  \nhunter fired, his shotgun choked so the buckshot slammed into me  \nlike a solid fist.  \n  \n\n\u0026nbsp; Lester the Dark Fox saw my sacrifice and fell to the ground.  \nHis eyes went normal as I died, and he knew his destiny lay with me.  \nI'd given him back his soul, brought him back from the Dark to the  \nLight, and his last redeeming act as Protector of the woods was  \nto pass his power to me.  \n  \n\\*  \n  \nI'm sure George Lucas got his Light and Dark Side of the Force  \nfrom watching some Wildlife Protector Fox, cause we were here before.  \nYeah, we draw on the life-force all around us, made by living things.  \nThe plants and animals humans can see, but also the teensy ones you  \ncan't see, and the whole planet.  \n  \nCan't see the forest for the trees? And you can't see the  \nplanet for the horizon, can't even see that all people live and have  \nneeds and wants. Y'all just think about yourselves, like you're still  \ncubs: gimme, gimme, gimme!  \n  \nPart of being a Wildlife Protector Fox is, I don't get the  \nluxury of just thinking about myself. Not just a few squirrels, or  \na fox or wolf; I get the whole woods in my mind, all of it at once,  \neveryfur and everything pounding away at me!  \n  \n\n\u0026nbsp; Remember way back, I said I got the responsibility first, then  \nsome power. It's like reaching out to a hurricane, touching just one  \npart, trying to make sense of it and bring order to it. Luckily it's  \nnot hard to keep it that way.  \n  \nI think the woods got so messed up because Lester dropped the  \nmetaphoric ball when he Went Over. He stayed Dark, and sucked the good  \nfrom the woods. Humans came to the woods and destroyed the beauty, and  \nLes got scared he couldn't handle them all. His mind retreated, back  \ninto the hurricane.  \n  \nLester the Protector Fox was getting old, had a crisis of  \nconfidence, and got scared. Then he got angry at himself for his  \nweakness; so fear led to anger, anger led to hate, hate led to  \nsuffering.  \n  \nI admit I'm not that strong either. I was mad at Lester for  \nforsaking his promise and duty. I've never been tested that severely.  \nBut y'know what? I found his Ring of Death, the proof of his weakness  \nand site of his anger and hate. And I don't blame him, don't ridicule  \nhim, don't trample his memory.  \n  \nI blame the humans who did this to him.  \n  \n\n\u0026nbsp; \\*  \n  \nI buried Lester's deflated body the day I took over the duty.  \nI was too surprised at being alive, being a fox with intelligence, to  \nnotice what hate had done, burned his fur and twisted his body. When  \nI found the Ring, I figured I was nuts because he talked to me, and  \nI answered.  \n  \nHe wanted to be whole, and I didn't know how. I went back,  \nfound his body, brought it to the Ring. None of the little bugs had  \ndared feed on the Protector; maybe they were afraid he'd make them  \ngo Dark too. But I don't think they're that bright.  \n  \nMy act of sympathy and sacrifice brought Les back to the Light.  \nI put his burned foxbody on the rock in the center of the Ring like a  \nsacrifice on an altar, and watched the Light take it and disperse the  \npain.  \n  \nBut I still have the same feelings of fear, anger, and hate.  \nI've Gone Dark because I need the power to fight humans, who attack  \nus for no reason. I'm scared of how easy it is for them to kill and  \ndestroy the beauty. I'm scared of myself for the anger and hate;  \nit's getting harder to remember to hate the sin but love the sinner.  \n  \n\n\u0026nbsp; So I visit the Ring of Death and vent, like Lester did. I  \nstill talk with him; maybe it's just a part he passed on to me with  \nthe job. It feels \\*so very good\\* to Go Dark, feel the power flow  \nthrough me; it's not really \\*me\\* chasing and scaring humans, burning  \nand ripping, it's the Dark Protector just doing his job.  \n  \n  \n  \n\n"}